Gallberry Stampede

Choices, choices, choices!  Should I run the 5k?  The 10k?  Or the 10 miler?  That was my big concern driving the hour to Scotland Neck Saturday morning.

Nothing is simple right now.

I know I should do the 10 miler but that would be equal to my longest run since surgery . . . and I have the Virginia 24 next weekend.  So it wouldn't be smart to to 10 miles I knew.  But heck . . . 10 miles isn't very far at all.  So I opted for the 5k race and once I finished I decided to go do another lap . . . so getting some time on my feet without risking hip complications too much.

I am getting better, both hip wise and endurance wise.  I ran the full 5k without walking!  Okay . . . that's not very great at all!  But it IS improvement and that's all I am looking for.  Just getting better.

I ended up finishing in 31:46 . . . that's 31 minutes and 46 seconds, not 31 hours and 46 minutes all you smart asses!  I was pretty happy with that . . . I definitely didn't run too hard and could have gone faster.


When I finished, I picked up a bottle of water and talked Amber Poole into going another easy lap . . . walking and running.  Tons of fun for me since Amber and I haven't had a chance to catch up since PNC bought RBC Bank.  Amber got a job with PNC just before the conversion, plus she had had her 1st Umstead 100 attempt . . . so we had a lot to talk about!

The Gallberry Stampede is a really small race . . . probably about 100 folks between all three distances.  With that advantage it turns out I was the only male in my age group (Older then Dirt) so . . . first place!  14th overall out of 41 . . . but a number of the entrants were walkers.  Hey . . . nothing wrong with that.  And I DID beat them!!!  :-)














So this coming weekend is the Virginia 24 Hour and I'm on a "relay" team called Team Awesome for another year.  I put the word "relay" in quotes because to me it's not really a "relay" since everyone runs the full 24 hours and you add up each team members distance.  But the RD calls it a 'relay' . . . so "relay" it is!!

My plan is simple.  No running at all.  I plan to walk as fast and as far as my hip will let me.  But I'm NOT going to do anything stupid.  When my hip says "STOP" . . . I'll stop.

But walking or running I haven't gone further than 11 miles since surgery so this will definitely be untried, untested waters.  My goal for the 24 hours . . . 50 miles.  That will be a 28:48 pace.  Seems easy enough.  Plenty of extra time in there for rest stops, bathroom breaks, etc.  Heck . . . if I take 2 hours worth of breaks I still only have to walk at a 26:24 pace!!  If I can hold a 21:00 pace for 22 hours that would mean I could cover over 62 miles!!!

So we'll see how this all goes . . .